Hello Darren

A lot of "family lore" contains tales of mysterious aristocrats. It's odd, however, that this story contains quite a lot of precise details but the surnames are missing:)

The first problem here is that there is, technically, no such thing as "a Lord", any more than this is such a thing as "a Mr". Lord is a form of address used by specific, categories of members of the English peerage and their families.

Had the mysterious "Lord" been a Duke, Marquess, Earl, Viscount or Baron, he would have been referred to and addressed, in certain circumstances as "Lord X" (X being the peer's title). However, in this case, his unmarried daughters would have been entitled to a courtesy title of their own (Lady for daughters of Dukes, Marquesses and Earls, the Honourable for those of Viscounts and Barons). Moreover, although he had no sons, unless he was newly created to his peerage there would have almost certainly have been an heir presumptive somewhere who would been honour-bound to take some reasonable care of the daughters.

Alternatively, he could have been able to use the courtesy title "Lord [Christian name] [Surname] if he was a younger son of a Duke or Marquess. But yet again, it would have been incredibly odd for his relatives not to have looked after the girls.

Like many family stories, this one may have been subject to a bit of exaggeration over time, but there is almost certainly a grain of truth somewhere. How does your known ancestry connect to it?

Caroline